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“Oh?” He could go to the Moon for all I cared. It would give me a breather.
“Yeah, you’re coming along. We’ll need someone to look after us after the procedure, treatment, whatever they call it. Then we can have a bit of a holiday too, you know? Make sure we have cold beers on tap, breakfast in bed, and all that. And it would be good for you! Get some sunshine on that skinny chest of yours.”
“When?” I needed to sit down so I did so on the sofa next to him. I even grabbed a slice of pizza for show.
“Have a bigger piece. And don’t eat too fast—gives you gas.”
Yes, thank you, Lewis. His mate, Taz or whatever, snorted like he was ten years old.
“When is this holiday?” I asked, even though I didn’t want to know. I didn’t want to go to bloody Turkey. I wasn’t even sure I had a valid passport, not that it would be of any concern to Lewis.
“I dug out your passport, it’s still in date,” he said and pointed his beer bottle at me. “I know what you’re doing.” He looked over at Taz and Dave. “He’ll try to get out of it. He’s a right wimp.”
I wasn’t. I just…
“October. Second week. It’ll be great. Much cheaper than paying for veneers here.”
“My sister’s wedding is that weekend. You said we’d go.” I had to say it. If Lewis had been annoyed earlier, it was nothing compared to now. My heart was beating far too fast as he sneered at me. I took a small bite out of the pizza to placate him. It felt like an entire loaf in my mouth.
“Your sister hates me,” he said, then regaled his mates with the story of when Willa had poured a glass of water over his head at dinner because he’d said something ‘innocent’, which had actually been wildly insulting. My family wasn’t fond of Lewis, and I didn’t blame them. My boyfriend was a dick.
Rather than say anything else about Willa’s wedding, because Lewis would just get meaner, I mumbled something about having just started a new job and not having any leave but promised I’d pop it in my diary.
Lewis took a swig of his beer. His mates stared at the TV.
“Get us some cold beers, Hugo.”
Anything to get out of the room. I took a quick detour to the fridge and returned, placing three beers neatly on the table.
“See? He’s useful sometimes.”
“You said he wasveryuseful.” Taz made rude gestures with his tongue stuck in his cheek. The three of them cackled.
So. He was at least out to this lot. Lewis wasn’t out at work. He wasn’t out to his parents or his family. To them, I was the roommate who slept on the sofa because I couldn’t afford a place to live. How kind of him to help a mate in need, they’d said. He assured them it was only temporary. That ‘temporary’ had lasted almost ten years.
I wanted to go to my sister’s wedding. I’d already been fitted for a suit. I’d booked a hotel. It was all on the invite that I had stuck on the fridge doorwhere Lewis could see it, but he booked this holiday anyway just to get at me. He’d done things like that before, not a care in the world for anyone else. That’s the kind of person he was, and I’d always put up with it because I loved him. Because I was his boyfriend and supposedly he was mine.
I shut the door on them and went and had a shower, tried to scrub the anger out of my skin. The bedroom was cold, and I shivered trying to get into a tracksuit. Lewis didn’t like me sleeping in clothes. He didn’t like me sleeping naked either. Said I was a frigid human icicle and kept him awake at night. Sometimes I slept on the sofa. Sometimes Lewis didn’t come home at all, then I’d have the bed to myself, so I didn’t mind, even though I knew what it meant. I didn’t want to think too hard about those kinds of scenarios.
I threw the rest of the pizza in the bin. Then I fished it out again and threw it out the window. It landed with a dull thud on the ground three storeys down. If Lewis had found it in the bin, he would have taken it out and brought it to me. Made me eat it.
Not that it mattered. I’d only managed a measly eight thousand, seven hundred and seventy nine steps today, and where I would usually have forced myself to go out and make up those steps, I didn’t dare leave. I didn’t have the strength. I knew what was coming in a few hours, when Lewis came back from clubbing, drunk, and picked a fight then demanded sex. He probably wouldn’t be able to come, and it would go on for far too long before he’d give up and tell me it was my fault because he didn’t find me attractive.
I didn’t blame him. There was nothing attractive about Hugo Burrows. Not anymore.
I just needed one thousand, one hundred and twenty-two more steps so nothing else bad wouldhappen today.
Popping my feet into my trainers, I snuck out the door and managed to get all the way downstairs. Up again. And down. My chest heaved with the effort.
A thousand.
Once more. Down. Up. There. I’d done it.
I could hear laughter. The beat of the music became heavier, but the ringing in my ears almost drowned it out as I collapsed on top of the duvet, toed off my trainers and let them fall onto the carpet. Lewis would scold me later, make me get up and put them on the shelf.
Later.
I fell asleep. Thank God for small mercies.
